5. HONESTY – The Honesty of Luz Long
For the rest of the Olympics, Luz spent his evenings with Jesse developing a warm friendship. As Jesse would later recall of these nights, “We made them count. We crammed as much understand- ing and fun as we could into every hour.” For years after the games, Luz exchanged correspondence with Jesse, telling him about his studies to become a lawyer and news about his wife and son. Luz’s life changed dramatically when World War II started and he was forced to join the German military. Around this time, Luz wrote his last letter to Jesse asking him to find his son after the war and to tell him about his father and the friendship he had with Jesse. He signed it, “Your brother, Luz.” They would not meet again. Six years after the war, Jesse did what Luz asked him to do and met Luz’s son Karl. Jesse told Karl how much Luz meant to him. Most importantly, he told Karl the most meaningful thing Jesse learned from his time with his father, “the priceless knowledge that the only bond worth anything between human beings is their humanness.”
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